Secrets of Desire
by Loveforthestory
Summary: She finds the book one late afternoon. And on that grey autumn day, with rain drizzling outside and a fire burning in the fireplace inside, this story starts.
1. Chapter 1

Secrets of Desire

An introduction

She finds the book one late afternoon. She is letting the hours of the afternoon burn into an early slow evening together with the fire in the fireplace in the small living room while it is drizzling outside.

In the house she is currently sharing with Miles and Monroe she has found a small room with one window, one small wooden desk and a couple of bookshelves against the wall on her right. The books are still there after many years, untouched. A luxurious treasure in this blackout world where books hold the stories of a word long forgotten.

The late pale afternoon light streams in through the glass of the large window in front of her. The rain outside brushes the red, orange and golden leaves in a sad and grey landscape of mid autumn.

Her boots make soft noises when they brush the wooden floor under her. She lets her eyes move over the covers and titles before her. And then, she finds it. Standing modestly, discreetly and silently between the others. A deep autumn red draped all over the cover, the letters of the title on the spine of the book small and faded. But the words _secrets_ and _love_ have made it through time. Charlie looks over her shoulder before she dares to reach for it. Her heart beating just a little bit faster than it should over the sound of the silence in the hallway.

Monroe and his partner in crime in all crimes involving whiskey, _her uncle_ , are somewhere outside on the porch, drinking or doing whatever it is they do these days when there is no adult supervision in the form of her mom around. She lets her eyes move over the letters. Her heartbeat and soemthing swirling low in her belly that moves in a pleasant yet bold way to her chest, tells her this is not like any other book.

Charlie listens. She only hears the sounds of the drizzle and the low voices of Miles and Monroe fading into the autumn afternoon and rain outside. And then she slowly reaches for the book. She moves it away from the shelf and other books. The book is heavy in the palm of her hand as her fingers gently trail over the front cover. The weight of the book is now gently in her hands as the scent of the paper from the book moves towards her. The red of the cover lush and yet deep. Reminding her somehow of the deep colour of the fullniss of soft red lips.

Her eyes move back to the front cover. There is a detail of a picture on the cover of two people entangled in each other in a stimulating, breathless and yet raw sensual and at the same time beautiful way that makes her heartbeat even stronger and faster.

She opens the book, her eyes going over the many illustrations of something that has only been quick, fast and meaningless to her. Until now. There are many illustrations in the book, giving her a new enticing sense of what it can be. Soft. Loving. Intense, hard. _Stimulating._

It had makes her aware of the place where her thighs meet. It makes her skin warm and tingle. It makes her heartbeat go faster with every turn of every page. Her mind is racing, busy imagining what it would be like, what it would feel like. What it would be like if it was her. If it is her with that someone there in those pictures. That someone who could make her feel exactly the same way that is oozing from those pictures in front of her.

The details of the images are filling her thoughts. She takes some time to read the words on the pages that are sensual instructions with the pictures. They are overwhelming with all kinds of new possibilities and new to her and filling all of her mind and belly and senses. it is just her and the book and how the book plays with her body and senses.

Until she hears a pair of boots, and then another one. _Inside_ the house. A door closing at the other side of the house and Monroe's voice reaching her before Miles' voice does. Her head jerks up from the pages in front of her as regrets fills her belly for having to part with the book. She quickly shoves the book back in its place with haste in her fingertips.

When she walks through the hallway on her way back to the living room she tells herself to calm down. The images of the book are still burning inside of her belly and are keeping her company with every step she tooks towards the living room, Miles and Monroe. She cannot outrun what the book just woke up in her. The book is still tugging at her, and it is already inviting her to visit it again.

* * *

Chapter

1.

She walks into the living room and walks straight into the banter of the two men children she is sharing this house with now her mom is helping Aaron to get Priscilla and their life back to the normal it will never be.

Charlie made the decision to get on the road with Miles and Monroe herself and to fight where and when they can to remove the last and final waves of Kaki threat to humanity. She felt she needed the fresh air, the rhythm and freedom of being on the road like she needed nothing else and she is realizing, day by day, the three of them can indeed do this, together. Fight, live, _be._

'...I'm hungry Miles.' Bass grunts, while he leans against the kitchen counter of the small kitchen. Charlie's eyes soak up black leather jacket, broad shoulders and blue eyes that even on a grey autumn day like today, are still a piercing, captivating blue.

'You are always hungry, you moron.' Miles shoots back while he is leaning against the kitchen table with his arms crossed before his chest. He is a bit taller tham Bass, but both man are almost the same height as they are hungry.

He is looking from Bass to her with anticipation, when she walks into the kitchen and to the both of them. She hopes her cheeks do not look as warm as they still feel. Her hands and arms are answering to the need to cross them before her chest. Both Miles and Bass look at her like she has all the answers to their _what's for dinner_ _tonight_ problem.

'Well then...time to feed Monroe.' Charlie smirks, earning her a glare from Monroe and a grin from Miles.

She is almost on her way to grab the meat she has caught earlier when Miles has to open his stupid mouth. Of course he has to. He is her uncle and the former General of a whole damn Republic. It is his job to pay attention. She feels Miles' eyes going to her cheeks. Or maybe she is just imagining it, that one book and the inviting stimulating images still close to her.

'You all right kid?' Miles asks with a small frown on his face.

'I am fine, Miles... just a long day trapped inside.' Charlie nods to the rain outside which comes down harder now.

Thick drops of rain are falling from endless grey clouds and are beating against the windows as theyr reach their destination. The contours of the trees outside are slowly fading against the deepening grey sky. She sighs in the hope that she sounds believable. Truth is, she is fine, but she is also a lot of other things right now.

Charlie looks at Monroe, the large, tall and all kinds of annoying wall that is currently standing between her and the plates inside the kitchen cabinet behind him. She walks over to him and pushes him out of the way using the outside of her right leg. She cannot deny the heated wave of her leg making contact with the hard firm arch of his side and upper thigh with her hip.

She ignores the small smirk that appears around his stupid mouth nowadays when she is not afraid to come near him, _or even worse,_ touch him. The asshole seems to find personal pleasure and a very personal victory in every moment she is close to him. She does not allow him the pleasure of her rolling her eyes at him. It only seems to make things worse.

Of course the stupid ass has to open his mouth too, his lips curled in that sly lazy pleased happy grin that is Monroe.

'You sure you are all right ...Charlotte.' She does roll her eyes now at the dramatic pause he takes and the way she is _Charlotte_ now, not Charlie. 'Because I have to say..you look a little flushed.' He presses his lips together in that arrogant way he masters with perfection, while he looks straight at her. He is close enough to take in his scent and she is way too aware of that scent all of sudden. He has to move. Now. She sure as hell is not going too.

She looks at him, as she raises one eyebrow. 'And you are in my way Monroe. Move.'

She ignores the blazing blue of his eyes and the chuckle of her uncle's grin behind her, as she can still feel that blazing blue of him on her all the way through dinner.

* * *

One day later and the rain has not stopped. There is no news from Blanchard. It keeps them all locked in this safe house for another day with no current assigments. Miles spends the better first part of the day in his room, waking up late with a hangover and getting up for some whiskey and some whining directed at Bass.

Charlie spends the better part of her days with other books on the small but soft and wide chair in the far right corner of the room that does not have that draft that roams the room when the wind picks up. It is close enough to the fire to stay warm but far enough from a hung over uncle and his path from his room to the kitchen.

She is reading _a_ book. Not that book. Not the book that keeps demanding her attention. The images are still flowing through her mind the night before when she had tried to get some sleep.

It is an early afternoon. She craves for something to warm her up. She gets up as Monroe does not look up from his spot near the fireplace where he is drinking a glass of whiskey and is reading as well.

In the small kitchen, Charlie make some of the tea she has found the second day of their stay here. On the other side of the house, she can hear Miles waking up as his feet hit the wooden floor. She can mentally see the picture of him putting on his boots but not bothering with the laces.

She fills her mug with hot water and a smile around her lips as the scent of tea fills the kitchen. Her fingers always seem to be cold these days. She curls them with contentment around the large mug as she walks back into the living room.

Monroe is sitting on a chair close to the fire not far, but far enough, from her. She is about to take that first warm sip from her tea as she sees it. Right there on his lap in between some other books. Later she will realize, that he chose that moment for her to _let_ her see it. That he somehow had found it. That he knew she did too. _That book_. Her eyes fall on that one book with lush red on the cover and the images that stayed with her until she had finally fallen asleep with warm fingers sated on her lower belly.

Charlie is sure it had not been there when she had walked out of the room to make some tea. It had not been there when Miles was still asleep and not walking his ass into the living room as he does now.

And that means, as she will later realize too, that Monroe had waited for this exact moment. There it was. On his lap. That one book that she had placed back on that shelve. With haste. But she had believed she had done so with care. Apparently living with a highly trained soldier, the other General of a Republic and paranoid ex dictator meant she had not been careful enough when she had placed the book back on the shelve between the others.

Charlie can feel her heartbeat inside her chest as her breathing gets harsher and faster and she feels her breathing all the way through her belly when Monroe locks eyes with her and she has a mug of steaming tea in her hand. The book, _her_ book, lies between other books on his knee. He is flipping with an arrogant smug look in his eyes through a book that is on top of the small pile with a glass of whiskey casually in his wide hand. The pile contains novels and books of history he somehow managed to find in the house. But Charlie could not care less about them.

She hears Miles walk through the room behind her, but she is not able to look away from Monroe. Charlie's mouth feels dry and she feels hot waves shoot to her cheeks.

She even forgets to be pissed for just a couple of seconds. But then, she sees it. That slow burning arrogant pleased with himself look in his eyes that curls all the way around his lips. And she is starting to realize he planned this. The asshole did. She just knows. And then Charlie pulls herself together and the words _arrogant stupid asshole_ start to ring through her mind.

She stares at Monroe while he stares nonchalantly at her and for one second she cannot control her tongue, the tip brushing her bottom lip. She gives him her best annoyed glare right after that.

But of course it does not matter, that smug grin of his, mixed with something else Charlie does not want to see now, stays on his damn face. Miles stays in the room too.

'What's that?' Miles saunters towards the both of them near the fireplace. Making Charlie feel as overheated as the tea in her hands and while she stands right in front of Monroe and too close to her uncle. Her mind racing too figure out what his next move will be.

'That's a book you moron.' Bass looks at Miles, his voice is raspy and slow and low, so low Charlie can feel it inside her belly. And then, Bass looks straight at her, 'You should try it sometimes.'

Charlie is not sure if he is talking about literature in general or about something else completely anymore. All she knows that the swirl inside of her needs to stop. Now. But she still refuses to let go of the lock of their eyes he initiates.

Miles has decided this topic is way too boring for an early hung over afternoon and does not pay any more attention to his brother and the pile of books on his lap. He walks straight into the kitchen with a bored yawn and in need of a glass of whiskey. Or a bottle. Whatever he will find first.

Right before Charlie curls up on her place on the couch she feels his eyes on her, and he adjusts the books so red lush disappears back into deep brown and faded covers.

* * *

Later that afternoon, she needs a break and some fresh air. Monroe has not uttered one single word to her the past hours. Neither did Miles. Daylight is still there but the air is grey and the grey light outside puts a gloomy light over the deep coloured autumn leaves.

Charlie breathes in the cool clean autumn air the moment she feels it when she opens the kitchen door that leads to a wooden porch that is build around the back of the house.

Of course she is not the only one who has decided he could need some air. Apparently. Right across from her and leaning against the banister of the porch is Monroe himself. His eyes are on her the moment she walks outside. Charlie raises her eyebrow slightly but the rest of her face stays into special Monroe mode. Refusing to turn around and walk inside.

She came here for fresh air so she is staying for fresh air. She walks up to the banister. Her back is now turned towards the house and her elbows rest on the wood of the banister as she leans into it.

They do not talk as the sound of rain on leaves and the roof of the porch above them does the talking for them. Charlie tries to ignore him. But there is a lot of Monroe on the porch with her.

She can sense him, like she can sense a deer on her way to her and approaching her in the distance of a dense forest while she is hunting.

He steps a bit closer to her, and he isstanding right behind her. Her back is still turned towards him. He is tall. So tall. And close. So close. And somehow in a very impossible new way, not close enough because Charlie is all of sudden aware of every inch of distance between the both of them. When he finally opens his stupid mouth, there is a slow predatory pace in his words.

'You know...there are more interesting ways to experience some things than reading a damn book.'

She gasps against her own will but she has no choice. She hopes the soft sound did not reach him. She can almost feel him grin behind her. She can picture how he looks right now.

And then, when she expects him to say something more and be an even bigger ass he steps away from her as he lets the moment and the implications of his words burn between them in a way that makes her have to take a breath between the pressure building low inside of her belly.

She feels the contours and weight of his body behind her move away behind her when his boots hit the wood of the porch.

He has almost reached the kitchen door when he stops and looks at her. Charlie feels the overwhelming urge to close her eyes but she resists. She cannot stop herself as she looks up. At him. And then, Monroe looks passed her and at the treeline around the the house before his eyes finally find her eyes with a precise aim that sends a shiver down her spine that has nothing to do with the autumn chillness in the air.

'My room is next to that study room, you know, the one with all the books...' More low gruff Monroe is oozing from his words as his eyes play with her whole body, '...one door down the hallway. '

She watches Monroe walk inside, but it is the steel intensity in his eyes and the roughness of low words that stay with her long after Monroe has walked back inside.

* * *

 **Author's Note A little note, I do not own Revolution, this is fanfiction and a daydream about what could have happened too within this story. This is the first chapter of a story I have been working on since autumn came closer. I love autumn and I love working on this story! I am also working on a new piece called 'A gentle touch.' More about that one soon. Wishing you all a lot of great books and stories for this season..Love from Love**


	2. Chapter 2

Secrets of Desire

2.

Bass turns to his other side in his bed. A long agonizing frustrated sigh escapes from his mouth. The room around him is dark, his bed too empty. His gun close. Both his blades too. The wind is roaming around the house and is playing with the doors and the wooden walls of the old house. His trained mind is searching for sounds in the night that should not be there.

Bass fights with his pillow. A frustrated fist punches into the damn thing before he puts his head back on it. He can't fucking sleep. One, because of that stupid wind. Two, because of a brother snoring on the other side of the house. Three fucking walls behind them and he can still hear Miles. And three. _Dammit._ Three. Reason three concerns another Matheson.

That blush , and it _was_ a blush, hell he is so sure of that, that warm red blush on her cheeks the moment Charlie had walked into the living room two days ago, _had_ been there. He has enough experience with woman to know in exactly how many ways that blush could end up on that gorgeous face of hers. The idea of the many fucking ways _he_ could put that blush there shoot straight to his damn balls.

He had watched Charlie as she had been giving something away he was pretty sure she did not wanted to give away. She had acted like a true Matheson. A fast smirk and a smart mouth as a Matheson diversion. And maybe Miles was a complete and utter moron when it came to woman but he had seen it. That blush on Charlie's cheeks.

He had ached to find out what the hell was going on all the way through dinner. One table and her on his other side and so damn close. She had not avoided him, he had to give her that. Her blue eyes had pierced into his all the way through that dinner.

He used to run the fucking show in Philly, knowing what the hell was going on was his business. And everything inside of him told him that there was something going on. And if she thought he was going to let that one slide, than this time, she was the one that was delusional.

So he had waited for his moment. And after dinner and after Miles and Charlie got into a stubborn discussion about something he really could not give a fuck about, he had slowly backed out the room.

The door to her room had been open en he had decided, _being a gentleman and all that,_ to skip her room. For now. The hallway had lead him to the small study room. And when he did a sweep of the room, his eyes had caught it. That tiny detail he was trained to find. One book _, deep red_ , that was carelessly and hastily shoved back between the others.

The memory of that moment still brings a proud grin to his damn face. He had looked over his shoulder to make sure he was not going to be interrupted. The raised voices from both his brother and Charlie reached him. world.

Charlie and Miles had still been in the longest stubborn discussion in the history of ever. He had time. And a lot of it. His boots had sounded heavy on the wooden floor. And when he had stepped in front of the bookshelf, the title of the book had made him smirk. He had grinned a grin the size of half the continent. One look at the content of this particular book and he had figured it out.

And now, when he is laying in his damn bed with the autumn night temperatures dropping fast and the rain adding more chillness to the air in the room, Bass still feels the grin form around his mouth for figuring out exactly what had brought that blush on Charlie's cheeks. Hell, he had taken a good look at the book himself, enjoying it with a smile when some pretty good shit was there, page after page.

He had placed the book back. But as he had walked out of the room, he had not been able to not think of something to mess with her. Just to see what she would do. The moment she had spotted the book on his damn lap between the history books he had found in the same room had been fucking great. Watching her lick her bottom lip had been a fucking boatload of fun. And some other things. Miles not having a damn clue about what the hell was happening, only made matters even better.

But then, that moment on the porch. That porch where she had stood next to him and had not moved one inch away from him as he had looked at her. Seeing how she never backed down was already a fucking turn on. She had been her. He had been him. And that was the moment where things had gotten out of hand. And he might have said some things he shouldn't.

Or maybe, _maybe_ , there was something inside of him that said, _screw it all_. This was Charlie. And he had waited enough to not see what she would do.

Hell, that book. Just the thought of that book in _her_ hands. The thought of what those damn images had done to her are filling his thoughts. That thought now shooting straight to his dick. He sees her, alone in that small study room. Alone. Maybe licking her bottom lip like he has seen her do many times before. Her slender fingers flipping through the pages. Bass can see her, Charlotte with that book in her hands, lost in her world, those blue intense eyes of her going over the page as those cheeks of her fill with that blush.

And then he thinks of what she might be doing right the hell now. Because it is on his damn mind too. Bass has to bite back a groan. Hell. Double hell.

He kicks the blanket away from his thighs as he moves to his back with another frustrated curse.

'Dammit.'

Because right now he can't sleep for more than three reasons. One. That stupid wind howling around the house. Two. A snoring brother who is snoring even louder. And three, Charlie. Close. But now there is also a damn hard on he cannot ignore anymore.

He knows he shouldn't. He always knows. But he is Sebastian Monroe and he still can do whatever the hell he wants. It does not stop him. It never has. He feels the familiar grip of the palm of his right hand around hard need for aching release when he gives in to the image of her. The autumn wind roams around the house and she, Charlotte, is so damn close.

* * *

He is close. So close she can picture him so easily and her thoughts form an image that makes her want to give in to the pressure and the need hidden in her thighs to press them further together with more force.

She is in bed. Her bed. In her room. Without anyone. _Without him._ The night is dark. She is trying to fall asleep. The wind is strong and rustling through the leaves of the forest that starts on the left side of the house. Her blanket is warm.

She found the blanket on her bed the first night in the house when the season had moved into a new one. It had been the warmest of the ones they had found in the safe house when they had made an inventory of things that could be useful. That meant that the boys had looked out for her and thought of her. Either Miles or Monroe.

They can be stubborn and all kinds of stupid and childish but it had made her smile the moment she had seen it, waiting for her on the bed in the room that lay in the middle of the house. Of course she had not let either of them see that smile.

Monroe. Stupid full of himself delusional Monroe. He had been there with her in her room, the moment she had blown out the candle that is standing on the night stand close to her bed.

When the house was finally silent and she was surrounded by the privacy of her own thoughts in her own room, she had reached for the book again. It had been there on the shelf again when she went back for it. Monroe had placed it back. Probably to see if she would take it again. She wanted to stay away. She really did. She would not allow him that victory. But the strong sensual pull of the book and all the new things in it, had made her return to it.

She had gone through the pages. The light of long white candle on her night stand had illuminated the pages of the book. She had to stop at one particulair page. There was one image.

One page andd one passionate picture of a man close to a woman, his strong wide chest behind her, his hand between her thighs. His fingers just out of sight, as the picture had not showed her that part, but her imagination had completed the picture in her fantasy. A page filled with passion was filling her as need for release had built up slowly when she had looked it. Alone, in the dark, hidden from the rest of the world in that corner in her room when it had been her, the book and the light of one candle.

And when she had put the book back on the night stand and she had blown out the candle, she had curled up under the blankets. The room had filled with that scent of chillness in the night and a candle being blow out. And then, he had been there. Mixing with the image of that one page. Monroe. And then, the pages in and of her mind had filled with images all on their own.

And that anonymous man on that page had turned into one man she knows so well. A man she had fought with for so long now, in so many ways. A man that is her life now, together with Miles and this life on the road. Monroe. It had been dark blonde curls and a wide muscled chest that had stoot behind her in her mind, close enough to almost feel the lines of his chest against her back.

And then that image had slowly moved into a new one.

His weapon belt. Dark brown leather. His long deadly blades. Both of them. And then, he is there. Standing next to a large wooden desk in a large room in some abandoned structure with industrial steel around her and in her eyes. But the room does not mater. The focus of that image is him. She cannot see his face, but she can see the contours of a strong jaw. Her minds gives her new details with every new breath. Scruff that is shorter somehow there in this room. And when he turns to reach for his weapon belt on that table, his long body, muscled and hard, turns so her eyes have nowhere to go but to his shoulder blades.

She can see him. So clearly. His wide shoulders in that deep blue shirt that is a reminder of half a continent taken by him. The contours of strong trained body lines visible through the fabric of his shirt. She thinks about his back and moves her thoughts to the arch of his neck. Wild dark blonde curls are brushing the nape of his neck. His large hands move around the weapon belt with those two blades. The dark brown leather is moving through skilled large deadly skilled fingers. His large deadly skilled fingers.

She can see him as he adjust that weapon belt as he is so close that she can hear the blades and belt clicking through her own fast soft breathing that borderlines panting. She can see his strong large fingers at work, locking the belt around his hips with his blades close to those strong wide thighs.

She does not want to. It should be anyone but him. But the truth is, there is not one man, not one man as strong and rough and raw and impossible as him. Not in the way he can breake free so much inside of her. Not in the way he includes her into his fight, into his life somehow, without her even having to ask for it.

Not in the way he always has to be an arrogant son of a bitch to her and then puts his own ass on the line to get her out of whatver trouble found her. Just as she does for him.

It is all that. All in one man. Monroe.

She shouldn't. But she can't hold back. And so, the images of that book and the sensual raw passionate possibilities transform to images of what he could to her. They turn into fantasies of knowing, _knowing for sure_ , that he could it all to her. That he will deliver.

And for once and finally, the certainty of that certainty is bigger than the _no_ in her mind. Passionate thoughts and need take over. And her hand moves to her thighs. Gently stroking her belly, and the side of her breast on the way down. Gently touching her thighs under her blanket, warm and hidden. Her hand moving the blanket as she moves her hand to the one place where the possibility of release lays.

The thought of finally giving in, the thought of the forbidden images in her mind. The thought of letting go. Of diving into the possibilities of lethal danger and and cruel ego blue are making her wet before she has even touched herself. The moment she starts to stroke herself a soft moan of release moves through her body and escapes her lips.

She is almost there, there where he is filling every one of her senses. There were the rhythm of her right hand is escalating as her skin is warm and sweaty. There where there is not stopping this anymore. And then she is back on the is back with him being Monroe and tall and insufferable and annoying and his own stupid arrogant self. And then his words reach her, again, like the wind howling around the wood of the house outside. His voice gruff and low and dripping with so much.

 _You know...there are more interesting ways to experience some things than reading a damn book._

She has to abruptly stop the movements of her hand, that now lay on warm wet swollen sensitive skin and between her thighs. And with want and desire laced with just a hint of left over anger she can not push out of this moment completely , another emotion she knows so well when it comes to him moves under the blanket with her.

Rage. Rage for his arrogance. Rage for herself for not being able to shake him out his thoughts.

Charlie kicks the blankets away from her legs as the anger builds up further. And his voice and face are there again, like an echo on the autumn wind.

 _My room is next to that study room..._

She takes a deep breath in as she lets it out again. She thinks about the hunger between her thighs that doesn't want to seem to be satisfied with the touch of her own fingers.

And then, after the want and desire and rage she feels another emotion that is filling the cool night as she feels the slightest grin move around her mouth. It is the strength of his stupid words that give her the final push for what will be next.

He will not know what hit him is the dominant thought in her mind. He can play with her. Mess with her. But she, she can do the same. And maybe, find that release she is craving for. The small grins turns into a stronger smile that she feels flowing through her eyes and as anticipation in her lower belly as she gets out of her own bed. She is on her way to the hallway. And then, there is one more emotion, that is filling her completely.

Determination.

* * *

 **Author's Note** I wanted to thank you for all your kind reviews, follows and favorites for this story! I am going to work on chapter three soon, Love from Love


	3. Chapter 3

She grabs her jeans and shirt from the bed. Her jeans travels smoothly over toned thighs. She leaves the top button of her jeans open with a small smile that plays with her lips. She decides to forget her bra.

The fabric of her shirt is brushing her nipples. They immediately respond to the touch of the fabric caressing her sensitive hardening nipples. Her breasts and the rest of her body are still awake from touching herself with the images fuelling her fingers. Her body is awake with thoughts and possibilities of _him._

She walks out of her room and closes the door behind her. The book still there in her room on her nightstand, next to the candle in the candle stand.

With determination and with her bare feet touching the wooden floor, Charlie walks through the hallway of the silent house. The sound of her feet on the wood of the floor mixes with the nightly wind that is still roaming in squalls of autumn around the house.

She stops before his door, deciding she will give him the courtesy of a knock on his door, just to mess with Monroe and confuse him a bit more. Thoughts of heated angry payback for him being his crude presumptuous self, are filling her mind. The sound of her fingers making contact with his door pulsates through her belly.

One knock on his door and he knows it is her. He pushes himself up from the mattress as he leans on one elbow, the blabket now somewhere aournd his middle, as he he sits up in his bed.

'Yeah?' His voice is low and hoarse.

The door slowly opens. And then she is there. Charlie. All of her. The way she is closing the door behind her is the first thing that gives him an internal warning the size of Texas in his damn mind. She is stepping into the room like she is sneaking up on a deer right before she shoots the damn thing. She walks to the bed. _H_ _is_ fucking bed.

There are about five whole fucking seconds where he can still pretend she is here because there is something that has to be fought or killed outside. But this is Charlie, and she would never ever ask for his help. Hell, she does not even need his help. She can fight or kill anything out there herself.

But then his eyes move to her shirt. _No bra_. And then they move even lower, to her jeans. _Unbuttoned_. His mind is busy as hell to answer the question of why the hell she would forget them. Bra and button. Her pants opened enough around her lower belly and hips to expose just a hint of god damn panties.

And hell, then he knows. She wants something all right . And with Charlie Matheson that could be a lot of things. From his head on a silver plate to just some plain good old fashioned insults with loathing and sarcasm.

But her eyes do not scream kill, or insult or loathing. They scream pay back and something else his cock is registering with craving and panic all in one. He swallows as the tip of his tongue wants to move over his lips. He fights the urge and wins that that battle.

Charlie watches his tall body in his bed, and even in the little light that reaches them from the moon outside, she can see his eyes and the lines of his jaws and moustache around his lips.

'Charlie...' his voice is raw and low _and all him_ but there is just the slightest hint of overwhelmed panicked man in there as well. 'Anything wrong?'

Charlie cannot help but smirk at the way he is trying to be all casual Monroe.

It is dark but he can hear the small satisfied huff of air escaping from her lips that forms into a small predatory smirk. She walks slowly, _so slowly_ , but with determination in her steps, to the bed. The light from a small moon and stars outside that moves through the gap between the curtains, falls on her face and her lush fucking hot as fuck lips.

Charlie watches Monroe. She takes in his tanned skin, the strong lines of his shoulders and chest. Strong lips under a moustache, scruff, eyes that still manage to find her, even in the dark room. The v-line of his shirt exposes the start of a wide chest.

He is in his jeans and shirt. She knows he still sleeps in them, even when they are not out there on the road anymore. His weapon on his nightstand. Always ready to go, never not ready to fight, kill or defend.

'I couldn't get any sleep,' her eyes are not letting him go, 'and I was thinking...maybe you are right, Monroe.'

'I... uhm.. you were huh?' He feels tension in his throat and jaws. Telling himself to not look at the way hee tits play with the fabric of her shirt. Charlie admitting he could be right about something is a first but right the fuck now it could only lead to a whole lot of trouble. _Naked wet willing Charlie_ trouble.

Charlie enjoys every second of confused Monroe. She is soaking up every single second of this start to whatever is next.

But there is also something else beating with her wild heartbeat. It flows right under her skin. Something she is still masquerading. Desire. Trying something new. Surrender to wanting to feel what it could be. Images of the book that is on her night stand in the other room mixing with that pressure between her thighs in a strong powerful way. His raw words on that porch. The man before her. What he could do. To her.

'Yeah, you are right, sometimes there are more interesting ways to experience something than reading about them in a damn book.' Her voice is steady.

She is repeating his own words as she moves to the end of the bed and slowly places her knee on the mattress before her. His mattress. His thighs and legs hidden under the blanket and so, so close.

She watches how his mouth starts to move as he is about to curse something. She knows this without a doubt because she can see the tunder of those curses in his eyes. But she does not give him time to do anyting. her eyes lock with his. She keeps on moving, as they both hear the creaking noise of her body being moved onto his bed. Charlie easily moves her body towards him, as she still keeps her distance. Telling him, she is in control. She will dictate how much distance there will be between him and her. Dictating how much he cannot touch her now.

She straddles his legs, right under his knees and so very much out of reach for him. But his eyes, his eyes are on her, glued on her like nothing else matters now. It fills her with a powerful sense of control.

There is a moment where she is realizing she is too stubborn to stop this. And then that moment is followed by the moment where she realizes she does not want to stop this. Realizing she wants to try and taste this. She wants to know what it will be like.

What it would be like to touch herself, right in front of him. To come with him so close. To come with those eyes on her and her fingers inside of her panties.

Bass watches her, as Charlie has straddled his legs. Her strong thighs are pinning his legs in one place, only a blanket separating them now. The thought of her pussy so damn close to his skin is making him hard as fuck. He feels the pressure of her thighs and whole body on his legs as his heart is racing like an idiot in his damn chest and he presses his tongue against his teeth. There is a part inside of him that wants to yank her closer and fuck her right the hell now under him. The other part that is hard with anticipation where she will take this, wins.

Bass decides to sit back and enjoy the show.

One look, one arrogant and almost crude anticipating look from him and she knows she will see this through.

She keeps her movements slow to make sure he follows her hand. To make sure he will understand where her hand will travel to. She makes herself comfortable, adjusting her weight so her ass touches his legs now.

Her hand starts to slowly move over the lines of her neck. The image of the book close. The image of a man's lips on a woman's skin, slowly kissing and tasting the skin of her neck. She looks at Monroe, she looks at the moustache and scruff around his mouth and it is so easy to let go and imagine those lips on her skin, on her neck. She can almost feel him there as his eyes are there to follow her every movement.

Bass slowly shifts his body to give his damn balls and hard on some space and relive. He watches how Charlie touches herself, right there in front of him. He soaks up how she lets her hand move sensually over her tits, teasing them as she moves even lower. Her hand is now on its way to her belly, as she slowly plays with the fabric of her shirt.

Her breasts under the fabric are out of reach and out of sight. But those hard nipples of her, visible and strong and so fucking hot, are driving him slowly insane. And then, _fucking hell,_ her hand moves even lower and is on her way to those tiny fucking panties that are barely visible with those jeans of her still around her hips and ass.

It is the moment her fingers start to slide into those tiny fucking panties his cock twitches in his damn pants. He can see the start of dark blonde curls just above the line of her panties, and hell, does he want to rip that jeans and shirt right of her.

Charlie watches a broody hot strong wave of lust wash over his face at the exact moment her fingers find her clit. And she cannot fight back the moan that was not supposed to escape.

His low grunt coming from the back of his throat fills her with sensual power and her hands stroke her clit again. And again. Her ass is rhythmically moving over his legs, creating a rhythm that will make her come, fast.

Bass looks at her as he cannot fucking do anything more than look at her. Free, wild, and god damn beautiful. He used to run a whole damn Republic but all he can do now is sit and stare and take in every second of her.

There are not many people who can mess with him the way she can, and there are even less woman that can fill his mind the way she does. But hell, Charlotte, she can. Over and over again, with every stroke of that hand in her damn pants, out of his sight, bombarding his mind with images of her wet curls and her hands moving through wetness between those thighs of her.

Charlie lets her eyes roam over the bulge in his pants, that is visible even through the layers of his pants and the blanket before her. And she knows, she does this to him. She is making him look at her with this raw Monroe hunger. She is doing this. To him.

The image of Monroe moving his hand over his cock under the blanket is what makes her come. She moans and smirks at the same time as sensual pleasure takes over and makes her forget the rest. And all there is, is her hand between her thighs, stroking herself, her breathing, her release and Monroe so close she can feel and hear every of his harsh intakes of breath when she comes against her own hand, buried in her jeans.

Her body is still shocking with lust and an orgasm that was like an autumn storm inside of her body. Her skin is wet with sweat, her hand is still in her panties as she is breathing harshly and her eyes are closed to control her breathing. One of her hands is resting on his left thigh, right above his knee.

When she opens her eyes he is still watching her, but there is also something else happening in those lust filled eyes of him. His eyes are harder and more steel.

Bass watches her as she comes down from her high. His dick is almost exploding with aching lust for her, as he watches how her lips are lush and wet.

Charlie licks her bottom lip. She has to, as she is attacked with that hungry wolf stare he is giving her and that smart crude mouth of his that is open in shock and raw awe and lust. She has seen his eyes like that once before, years away in a different part of the continent.

She almost gets lost in their eyes that stay connected. But then she remembers what she came here for. She remembers all the strenght of powerful control and desire that are still moving through her body. Wit a satisfied smirk, she determinedly pushes herself up from his legs as she easily gets of his bed.

Charlie is moving away from his bed and raw steel eyes. Her jeans are still open. She is still out of breath. Her thighs are still trembling, the fabric of her shirt is sticking against her breasts as it is wet with her sweat that got her all the way to her release.

She almost makes it to the door. Almost. Because in just four seconds he has gotten out of his bed. He pins her to the wall next to his door with his strong tall unsatisfied body right behind her. A raw low grunt escapes his mouth the moment he locks her against his chest and shoves her against that damn wall.

Her breasts touch the wall, and his lock is firm but not too much. It creates friction of the bricks of the wall against breasts and Charlie feels her whole body responding, again.

Bass smiles a crude smile with a fast jerk of his mouth. If she thinks he will let her walk after that little stunt she has just pulled, she is fucking wrong. She is not going anywhere. He uses his thigh and his hard on to keep her in place. Right the hell against that wall and his chest. She is staying there until he shows her what he can do.

Charlie waits, breathes, tingles as she feels his hard cock for the first time against her ass and lower back. She bites back the moan it threatens to draw out of her. She does not want him to know, she cannot let him know how much her body wants to add more pressure against his chest and thighs now.

But there is a small grunt and deep breath escaping his chest that tells her it is too late, that he might already know. Maybe he has always known.

Monroe is not touching her. He is not hurting her. He just keeps her there, between him and the wall of the room. He is just keeping her in place with his body.

The sound of a zipper behind her, and a hungry groan rolling from his chest makes her thighs spasm as she feels how he shifts his weight behind her. She is pulsating with wetness and forbidden want. She never knew that just one sound, _the sound of his zipper_ , could almost make her come again.

His thighs are placed against and around her legs, showing her exactly how tall he is and how much control he has over this moment. Over this room. Over _her_.

With strong powerful strokes he answers to his throbbing cock in his hand as he keeps her pinned in one place. Right where he can feel her. He can take in her scent. He breathes in the scent of her touching herself earlier. Images of how her tits would look in his damn hands and how those wet curls between her thighs would look if he would slowly open her legs, right the hell in front of him.

Stroke after stroke builds up his throbbing release that he can feel shooting from his balls all the way to his thighs, her perfect ass bouncing against them. And it is the small aching needing moan escaping from her throat the moment his hand working his cock touches her ass, that makes him come.

He is breathing harshly as his head is close to her hair. She does not move as he feels how she shifts her weight to move it from the wall and more towards him. He almost gives in. But he can't. Not when he is not even sure what they are doing. What she is doing. What she is trying to do to him. The risks are too high to high to give in.

When he is able to catch his breath he moves away from the wall, giving her back her space. Charlie feels the sudden void that Monroe creates by stepping away from her body. She turns slowly, biting her lip and facing him head on.

God, he swears, it is what gets him into all kinds of fucking trouble with her. Mind, cock and a piece of his heart she does not even know she fucking has and that is unable to leave her behind, or hurt her or not save her ass when she gets herself into all kinds of fucking trouble again. Those eyes of hers, that heated eager stubbornness to always lock eyes with him with that challenging fire in her eyes.

He feels her eyes on him as she takes her time looking at him while he grabs a cloth to clean his hand. His fingers close the zipper of his pants, his cock aching behind the fabric again. He looks at her. She is looking at him like they are both trying to decide something. She speaks first. Her voice is hoarse but all kinds of Matheson strength too.

'Goodnight..' A small heated smile around her lush lips meets him when she walks to the door, not looking away from him.

He just looks at her. There is a huff of air that rolls of his lips at the way she leaves him standing like some moron in his room. This woman. Charlie. Fuck. He stands there, until there is a fast amused cruel, but also a softly heated grin apearing around his mouth as he remembers how to fucking use his voice again. 'Goodnight, Charlotte.'

And he knows, that she knows, that this is far from over.

* * *

 **Author's Note** A special thank you to Threemagpies, for her feedback and friendship. And thank you to all of you. You are such an inspiration when I am working on my stories here. You have no idea how much your support means to me. Your feedback and support makes writing, something I always love, even more autumn gold! There willl be a new chapter for this story in the first week of January! Love from Love


	4. Chapter 4

Secrets of Desire

4.

Bass curses at some more fucking rain that has been beating down on him nonstop for the past three hours. The drops of rain mix with drops of sweat that travel down his neck.

He can see the contours of their safe house as grey blurry lines through the veil of rain that spreads through the whole forest. Bass moves his hand through his curls to move them out of his god damn face.

He has scouted the area, making sure those kaki assholes are not around. It has been one miserable long afternoon. All he wants now is to kick out his soaked boots, get out these annoying as hell wet clothes and get some whiskey inside his system. But even the beating of the rain and miserable clothing clinging to the hard lines of his body, can't keep her out of his damn mind.

 _ **One day earlier**_

 _She cleans her gun. She takes care of her crossbow. She hunts. But even when she is focussed on the forest and her next kill, her memory replays the low enraging groans behind her. His low enraging groans. And even when she tries to concentrate on the movements of her fingers as she aims her crossbow at what will be their dinner, the memory of his muscled thigh under the palm of her hand is there with every single heartbeat before her next kill._

 _He drinks. He argues with Miles. He takes care of his blades and gun. But even the burn of whiskey and a bitching Miles cannot stop the image of her coming with her fingers in her panties and her lush lips slightly parted with one final moan escaping from those lips of hers. His mind keeps on dragging him back to whatever the fuck it is that happened last night. The image of her fingers gliding into her damn pants are making him hard again as he sits on one of the steps of the wooden porch of the house._

 _After breakfast, Bass sits at the kitchen table with Miles. Both men are sharing a bottle and they are talking about Blanchard's next assignment and how Miles really should have killed the old bastard when he had the change, for making them wait in this safe house for so damn long._

 _The late afternoon light changes into early afternoon autumn darkness. Of course they are disagreeing on what that next move should be and Bass enjoys every fucking second of their discussion. It feels like the beginning, when their Republic had been young and life had been so much easier. When Independence hall had felt different with Miles still around._

 _They are in the middle of another round of insults when Charlie walks into the living room with a book in her hand. Her hair is still wet from the early morning rain and it is clinging gently to her temples. Bass focuses on his whiskey instead of the way her lips taunt him from across the room._

 _When she finally locks her eyes with his, he can see a clear challenging blue in her eyes that hides between all the other burning things that lay in her eyes that she somehow saves for him. Bass empties his glass while his eyes never leave her._

 _She has almost reached the couch. Monroe's guide her through the room like they had done so many times before out there on the road in one of their camps. Charlie looks at the familiar sight of Miles and Bass in the room with her, sharing a bottle. She was surprised at the easy way the three of them could make this arrangement work, but she isn't anymore. She has decided it is easier to accept that she, Miles and Bass make a good team on the road._

 _She looks at Bass' fingers, wrapped around his glass. It feels like whatever they had started last night in his room happened in another house. The dark cover of the night and the both of them alone, almost make it feel like it does not belong to the reality of this morning. Almost. Until his hungry stare and the way she is unable to not answer that stare with an urge to lick her bottom lip and taste that hungry glare of his, remembers her of everything that did and could happen._

 _The couch looks inviting in front of the fire Miles made two hours ago. Charlie had watched his skilled hands adjusting the wood before the sounds of the fire and its rich scent had filled the living room._

 _Bass 's eyes are drawn to the soft lines of her ass. Her jeans follows the lines of her ass, hips and legs effortlessly. Then he waits until she looks his way, so she has no choice but to notice how his eyes move over to her book._

 _Charlie takes a deep annoyed breath , bracing herself for what will be next. She almost makes it to the couch when he just has to open his mouth._

 _He can already see the fierce annoyance peak in her eyes and he has to bite back a smirk when he sees what he can do to her without even opening his damn mouth._

' _Going to read, huh?' Bass says, when he looks straight at her. Charlie can almost feel his stare burning through the fabric of her tank._

 _Charlie feels how her heartbeat accelerates with smug slow sex dripping from each and every of his words._

 _Miles is sitting with his back towards her. She feels the hot burn of what happened last night rushing to her cheeks and her core. She thinks about that one book that is hidden in the drawer of her night stand. The images mixed with the memory of him, and his scent mixing with hers in his room, are rushing through her veins._

 _She is pissed at herself. Pissed for the way her mind makes it impossible for her to throw something back in his face. Something. Anything. She hates it when he does that._

 _Luckily for her, an irritated uncle intervenes._

' _What in the hell is going on between the both of you?' Miles asks._

' _Nothing,' Charlie says, her eyes piercing into Monroe's. She can see the amused huff of air escaping his mouth as his breath brushes his moustache. She is pleased her voice sounds firm and almost neutral. Almost. Although she is not able to keep all the irritation out of it. 'He is just being an ass. Nothing new'_

 _Without looking at Bass, or her uncle, she turns her back towards the both of them. She curls up in a corner of the couch. her hair flowing over her shoulder in one graceful movement. She opens the book in her hands as golden locks are falling over her right shoulder. She feels the warmth of the fire in front of her brushing her face and the burn of his eyes on her behind her._

 _Fuck._ Bass can still see her on that damn couch as he stomps up the porch steps. He shakes his head when he tries to shove her out of his damn thoughts. He lets the kitchen door slam shut behind him as his boots hit the wooden floor. The living room is empty. He throws his leather jacket over a kitchen chair on his way to the small bathroom on his right. When he pushes open the wooden door of the bathroom, there is some late afternoon light streaming in through a smudged window. As he sits down on the edge of the tub he lets out a miserable sigh as he starts on the laces of his right boot first.

Before he can even move on to his second boot the muffled sound of approaching bare feet on a wooden floor stop him. And then, a couple of bare toned legs walk into the small bathroom. He curses under his breath when she is standing in front of him, wearing one of Miles' shirts that barely makes it to her knees.

Charlie stops when she sees she is not alone. She feels how his eyes move over her legs like he is caressing them with his fingers. He is sitting on the edge of the large tub. Broad shoulders, drops of sweat with the scent of rain, running down the strong lines of his neck. His legs spread, her eyes registering his wide thighs.

She went out early this morning to hunt. And when she had returned , her whole body had given in to warmth that met her inside. Her eyes had slowly felt heavier with every warm minute spent inside.

She had walked to her bedroom and grabbed her favourite shirt to sleep in. It happened to be one of Miles and she liked having his familiar scent close. Bass had been somewhere outside. Miles had fallen asleep on the couch with a bottle of whiskey balancing on his knee. She had saved the bottle and she had put a blanket over her uncle's chest before she had walked back to her bedroom to grab some sleep.

She had woken up with the sound of rain against the window of her bedroom and the inviting idea of a warm bath. She had yawned lazily on her way to the bathroom. The part of her brain that had just woken up had registered him too late.

There is a whole lot of Monroe waiting for her in a very small bathroom. The cool shadows of the almost dark room send a shiver through her body.

Bass notices immediately. Her eyes burn through the brisk air of the bathroom. She is aware she is wearing _only_ Miles' shirt. She is aware he is aware. She feels the sudden build up of something in her belly that is written in his eyes that is steel burning heat. It pulsates between them like a third heartbeat in the room with them.

'Come here..' Bass grunts. It's almost a command. Almost, because there is burning need for her hidden in those two words that take the edge of his low growl.

He has enough. He does not know whatever game she is playing, but he has enough of sitting around and wait for her to plot her next move. He is Sebastian fucking Monroe. He still takes what he wants.

The vibration of his voice is flowing through her body. She feels her own heartbeat. And then, she takes a first step towards him. She can see his eyes light up when she has made her decision.

She stops before him when his knees brush the outside of her hips. Her hand slowly moves to his temple as she lets her fingers glide into his wet curls.

He slowly moves his fingers over her side. She is standing between his legs as his fingers move up her shirt with every inch of her body he explores . The moment he feels her skin against his fingers is making him groan softly.

She watches how Monroe brushes her skin as he plays with their personal space. He is only touching her with two fingertips and she already feels wet warmth building between her thighs. When she think he is going to claim her breasts he stops. He makes a deliberate trail from her side to her belly. She pants softly when his fingers move through moist curls.

Bass feels a surge of steel lust moving from his balls to his cock as he registers how fucking wet he is making her. It is making him hungry for more.

Even when he is sitting down in front of her and she is standing in between his thighs, he is still tall enough so she has to meet his eyes right in front of him.

'So tell me something...' his voice is low. He has control over each and every word he needs her to hear. He moves through her wetness as his fingers move over her clit in a possessing way. He cruelly grins at hearing the first moan she cannot hold back., ' ...when you fucked yourself with your fingers on my god damn bed, ...did you think about these fingers, Charlotte?'

Bass adds more pressure to her clit before he lets two fingers slip inside of her with an excruciating slow pace. 'Did you think about them before?'

Charlie has to close her eyes because she is slowly breaking under his touch. He has found out her secret. The one she has been trying to hide from herself. She can't feel her legs anymore and she is not sure that her feet can carry her when his fingers slowly fuck her.

But then he catches her. She feels a long hard arm around her waist. She opens her eyes as she watches steel and hard lust for her in his eyes. So close. So deep. His fingers finding more pleasure inside of her. He moves his tongue over his lips when he keeps on moving his fingers in and out of her.

He adds another finger and moves deeper inside of her. She can hear the sound of Bass' fingers between her legs as Bass' steel blue eyes force her to come as all there is in this small bathroom are her own heartbeat and him. His fingers. How wet he makes her. Her thighs clenching around his large hand. The sounds she makes around him.

Bass feels a surge of wild lust in his cock when he watches and feels Charlie come. There is a smug victorious grunt rolling of his lips when he feels her spasm around his fingers. Her hand has moved over his shoulder to brace herself and her fingers are burning through his shirt. She has not even noticed but the fact she is reaching out for him to steady her, makes his cock swell with all of her.

Bass feels like he is going to fucking explode. When she opens her eyes again he can still see the lust inside of her eyes. She wants this. He wants this. He _will_ fuck her. Charlie takes in his scent of rain and sweat as Bass kicks out his boots and effortlessly pushes down his pants over toned trained thighs.

She watches his thighs as her eyes roam over strong balls and his wide cock. She bites her bottom lip to control a moan at the sight of so much man in front of her. He grabs her hips before he turns her around and yanks her into his lap with her back against his chest. His wide thighs encircle her.

He takes his cock in his right hand and moves the head to wet willing Charlie as he feels the warmth radiating from her entrance. She feels his rough curls brushing against the soft lines of her ass as she moves her hands to his knees to support her weight. Bass' arm around her middle pulls her close to his cock.

She turns so she can meet his eyes. She _has_ to see his eyes. His strong jaw line brushes hers. He teases her, the head of his cock now gliding over her clit. He watches her wet lips and her willing eyes that scream her want for him.

'This what you want?' His voice is rough in the darkening bathroom.

Bass feels raw need and control pumping through his veins as they reach his cock. His mind screaming he is going to fuck her. Her. Her eyes scream _asshole_ but hell, that dazed look, the way she opens her mouth slightly, her soft panting, he knows she will give in. But he wants to know she wants this as fucking much as he does.

When she finally answers him with a tilt of her hips to reach for his cock with her aching dripping wet pussy, his eyes light up in a dark, almost black, blue. A low groan from Monroe makes her feel like she has never felt before as she fucked, a low, certain sense of being wanted fills her as he fills her.

The last thing Charlie sees before she has to close her eyes to enjoy every inch of Monroe wanting her, is his moustache. His jaws. His dark lust for her in the way he looks at her. Bass curses as he finally feels what it is like to have her ride him as leans back to take in the curves of her ass.

He watches how she is slowly working her way up and down his cock. His eyes catch the moist dripping of his cock. All hers. His now.

Her soft sounds fill the bathroom as she feel how his cock responds to her panting, a twitch deep inside of her. Charlie gets lost in the rhythm of her own breath and his low grunts behind her. She can feel the muscles of his wide thighs at work under her legs. His legs are wide muscles support under her legs and hands as she is riding him. His arm is still around his middle, supporting her weight and moving with her every time he pushes inside of her.

His cock between her thighs is filling her, over and over again. Every time she lowers herself over his cock, she lets him fill her up even more. Until he has enough. Until she feels the shift in him.

His fingers claim her hips with force. His hands are wide and demanding, his arm almost crushing her middle as she cannot feel the bathroom floor under her feet anymore. Without pulling out of her, Bass lifts her up as he walks, with her in his arms, away from the tub.

She feels how he lifts her high in the air and how his cock finds another spot that makes her pant with that new sensation while he walks her across the room. She reaches behind her and moves her hand and arm around Bass' neck. Bass stops before the sink across from the tub.

He puts her filmy back on her feet as he places his hand between her shoulder blades. He pushes her forward. She braces herself with her hands now resting on the sink in front of her. He starts thrusting inside of her with a strong rhythm. She moans every time he fills her right before he pulls back.

Bass watches how his cock is moving in and out of her. He follows the line of her body with his eyes. Her hair is moving over her shoulder, just like it did on the couch yesterday when she was reading. Her neck flows into strong shoulders and a the arch of her back hidden under her shirt. And then, he watches _his_ hands around _her_ damn hips and the way he is pumping inside of her. That is the exact fucking moment he cannot hold back.

He yanks her closer with his hands around her hips as he chooses a pace that she seems to crave just as much as him.

Charlie's fingers curl around the cool material of the edge of the sink as she melts into his rhythm. The force of his thrusts vibrate all the way through her clit and with her eyes closed and Bass' hands around her hips, she comes right before him. It's like he has waited for her, as she feels one last deep thrust, right before she hears the low roar of his release close to her ear.

* * *

 **Author's Note I am so sorry this update took so long! Thank you to all of you who are still reading this story, I am already working on the next chapter(s) and will publish another chapter somewhere next week! Love from Love**


	5. Chapter 5

Secrets of Desire

5.

Of course Miles never lets them out of his sight for the next couple of days. Instead of snoring his day away on the couch with a whiskey buzz, her uncle looks for hers and Monroe's company. Charlie is sharing an evening and a bottle of whiskey with him.

Miles sits next to her. His knee is close to her leg as the both of them sit in silence without feeling the need to fill the silence with meaningless words. Miles just put the bottle to his lips when Charlie hears the heavy rhythm of Bass' boots behind them. The wooden boards of the porch sigh heavily under his weight and the memories of a bathroom filled with late afternoon shadows and the scent of sweat and lust.

He sits down next to Miles. Her eyes are still following drops of rain that are caressing the last leaves of the year before they hit the forest ground.

She can feel his eyes even before she turns her head his way. It does not take long before his eyes try to find hers over their casual conversation.

Miles and him are sharing memories of cities spread over half the continent. Miles is doing his best to pretend he does not feel the same as Bass about both men being together again with a bottle between them, sharing stories they only know.

Bass adjusts his leather jacket as he watches her. Her eyes finally meet his. Charlie can see a whole battle taking place in his eyes, a battle she feels within herself as well. The battle of wanting and not wanting to want.

'Can I have some?' Bass' voice is husky when he nods to the bottle in her hands.

Charlie tries to ignore the smolder in his words. 'Sure.'

Their fingers touch as Charlie hands him the bottle. The dangerous game they are both paying burning in both their eyes with Miles so, so close.

His eyes are exploring her face and stop at her lips. He forgets his whiskey for one fucking moment. They fucked. They have barely talked after all the fucking. And he finds himself in unsure territory.

Hell, he knows it was probably some one time hate fuck. Anger fuck. Whatever. He knows he'll probably will not have her again. And hell, he wants her. Again. Like fucking now.

But this is Charlie Matheson. She is danger and stubbornness and loyal fierceness in the swing of her hips and the deadly aim of her crossbow. She he watches her. He waits. He drinks and shares a bottle with his brother and her.

Neither of them speak after their short exchange of words. But Bass tastes her as he takes a sip from the bottle.

* * *

Two hours later and Charlie can't control herself. Not anymore. She feels annoyance mixed with lust as she turns to her other side, readjusting her blankets in a bedroom filled with the darkness of the first hours of the night and the sounds from the forest outside. It is driving her crazy. All those burning looks from Monroe, without his hands there around her hips to soothe that angry lust.

She has given up on the fight of telling herself she does not want to feel him again. Them again. His fingers, his skilled hands. His demanding eyes. Words that form orders so easily. His rough scruff, his infuriating low voice.

Her body has known it for a very long time. Her mind is finally catching up as the wall she has put between the both of them is slowly tumbling down. Everything is different now. Her life. The way she sees herself in that life. That world out there that has gotten so much bigger. All the truths that came with that expanse. The way she sees Miles. Monroe. Bass.

She is all alone when her bed is there for her to fall asleep in alone. The echo of his groan of release so close.

She has seen him fight. And this man comes like he fights.

She knows it will not be enough. But she can't control herself. Her fingers find her warm inviting thighs and moist soft curls as Charlie closes her eyes with a soft sigh.

* * *

When Charlie had gotten up from her place next to Miles on the porch and wished them goodnight, he had really tried to ignore the enticing curves of her hips and ass. His eyes had followed her as she had walked that ass of hers over to the kitchen door.

But even sitting side to side with a brother who would definitely kill him over and over again for thinking what the hell he was thinking, was not enough to control his damn cock and his damn mind. When Miles had been focussed on the bottle of whiskey in his hands, Bass had looked at the small smile that had been playing with her lips when her eyes had met his in a way they never met Miles'.

He is on his way to his room to get some fucking sleep. He is frustrated as hell. His hands are in his pockets. When he walks past her door he tells himself to keep on going. But then, his trained ears pick up on something that makes him hold his breath. Images of what the hell is going on, on the other side of this damn door in front of him are invading his thoughts.

There it is again. That sound that forms that one image of Charlie coming all around his damn cock. It has been there on repeat in his damn mind as nonstop torture. He pulls his hand over his moustache and mouth. It is driving him fucking insane. His right hand can't give him what only she can.

He craves to feel her again, that wet and tight feeling of Charlie so fucking close. He fucking wants to hear it again, that moan that had escaped her lips when he found that right spot deep inside of her.

He craves to personally show her everything she is probably reading about in that damn book of hers. Another soft sound of Charlie out of breath is reaching him through her closed door. He looks over his shoulder. He knows that a brother deep in miserable thought with a bottle of whiskey in his hands outside is no threat for the next couple of hours.

He has thought of it before. Hell, he has thought of this many fucking times. Her touching herself, the fucked up idea of him being the man that would make push her over the fucking edge. Being the man that would make her come with wet fingers buried deep inside of her. And now she is so fucking close as he hears another soft mean. Being patient when Charlie Matheson is panting only a couple of feet away from him makes all the remaining rational thoughts leave his damn mind within five seconds.

Bass does not hesitate as he opens her door. He does not even bother with knocking or waiting for her to invite him in. He does not give a fuck right now.

He finds her in her bed. Out of breath, on her right side and with her back turned towards him. Her blonde locks are falling over her shoulder blades and pillow. He can see her arm and her hand between her thighs as contours under the blankets. A candle is burning in its candlestick on the night stand. That damn book with images that are pulling at his cock now too, open and on her nightstand as well.

His eyes move over the page, where a woman on her knees is being well fucked. Her tits enticing and sending another bolt of lust to his , the anonymous hot as fuck woman in that book being fucked from behind in the same way he fucked her in that bathroom fill his chest and balls with pride and lust.

She is silent now. He can sense how she is holding her breath for just a couple of seconds. The room smells of her and the biting cold of the night. Fuck, he wants her. He wants to show her so fucking badly what he can do to her. He wants to do what she is doing there, right before him, tucked under those blankets.

Charlie can hear how he kicks out his boots. She knows she should be pissed. But Monroe just walking his ass in without even asking for her permission and him standing next to her bed now, is only turning her on even more.

She can hear the sound of leather in two large hands and without looking at him he knows he has thrown his leather jacket on the bed. She feels her clit throbbing with him in the room with her. She feels the warmth of her own thighs around her hand. And then, she can feel the shift of his weight on the mattress behind her as he joins her and his hard thighs are making contact with her bare legs under the blankets.

He moves one of his arms under her neck as he gives in to the craving of wanting her against his damn chest. She is warm and when he moves the blanket over the both of them he can sense the warm scent of arousal. The slightest sigh and her tilting her ass towards him are all the approval he needs.

'Couldn't sleep huh?' Bass grunts with a grin on his face.

He smirks smugly at the way she is rolling her eyes and at the same time is responding to his touch. Charlie wants to curse something at him but she knows he will not buy it. She does not even buy it herself.

The rough skin of his fingertips are stroking her hips. Charlie's hand is still placed over her soft and wet curls between her legs when her fingers slowly add more pressure against her clit as Monroe touches her side in slow agonizing but deliberate strokes.

She can feel his cheek brushing her jaw line as his body is an endless shield behind her. She does not even feel the brisk night air in her room as Monroe keeps her warm with his body and the whiskey on his breath.

Her bare legs are rubbing against the rough fabric of his jeans. His warm breath and his scent of whiskey and man are so close. She can feel the scar on his lower arm brushing her skin, the same scar that is imprinted in her wrist and herself.

She feels a possessive kiss in her neck. Bass soaks up the way she is panting because of the way he is touching her as he tastes her again, his lips roaming over the skin of her neck. He moves his tongue over her earlobe and bites it softly.

His hand is now moving from her belly to her thighs. He feels how she is inviting him, how her thighs slowly open for his hand. She tilts her hips forward to meet his hand. The wide palm of his hand brushes the wet curls above her clit. He grunts a curse roughly in her ear.

She feels a surge of want almost crushing her at the way she makes an impact on him, hard cock twitching behind her against her ass now.

He is adding more pressure when his fingers are now roaming smoothly over her clit. Her wet fingers are falling against his hand, when he takes over her course to her orgasm. It's his skin against her skin when she feels his fingers at work. His fingers brushing her entrance. New waves of lust are making her head spin.

'Don't..' Charlie's mind desperately tries to find the right words as her mind is dizzy with need for more.

She feels the smug huff of breath, his breath, behind her as it is crashing against the skin of her neck. He is enjoying this. She should be angry. She can't. Because his voice is there again.

'What..Charlie..' Her name has never sounded more obscene as he is pronouncing it right now. '...tell me...Charlie..' There is infuriating endless ego in his voice but also a low vibrating certainty she cannot outrun anymore.

Charlie squeezes her thighs together around his wide hand. Her own hand still crushed between her own thigh and his hand. 'Don't stop...' She finally finds the strength to talk again as she can sense his hot mouth so close to her jaw, his fingers on her clit. 'Don't stop Monroe...'

His eyes turn from deep blue to a hint of darkness at that last word of her. He bites her neck harder than he did before, as he hears his last name rolling of his lips, instead of the name he craves to hear from her. He knows she knows as he can sense the tension running through her. His hand claims the inside of her thigh roughly.

Charlie pants, feeling the change in him Bass...Bass...Bass, his name is pulsating through her mind between the throbs of her clit under his fingers. But she is not ready yet. So she melts into his arms as she makes more space between her thighs to let him in. She gives in, opening up for him, moaning softly as she presses her whole body against him.

Her melting into his chest and touch soothes a dark edge inside of Bass. He kisses her shoulder more gently now, his mouth moving over the skin he has just attacked before.

Bass moves his free hand under her shirt. His hand claims her left breast. He adds more pressure, taking personal pleasure in making her moan again. He takes his damn time and Charlie is done waiting. A strong throb in her clit almost too painful with anticipation now. She is about to explode. The sound of the name that is pounding through her mind every time he strokes her clit is almost rolling of her lips.

He can hear the battle in her wild breathing, in the way she is trying to gain more fraction with her thighs around his damn hand. He can see her struggle. But even he is not cruel enough to make her wait.

His fingers claim his clit all for himself and Charlie forgets about ego and how much she is supposed to not want this. And then, the possessive kiss from before turns into a softer one, as his lips move over to her shoulder and his arm presses her against his cock, hard and waiting for her behind her. Bass watches how she is losing herself because of his fingers buried between her thighs. She is fucking beautiful.

'Got you...' Bass's voice is husky and so close to her ear as he makes slow circles around his clit. Experience dictates his rhythm.

He slips a finger inside of her. And then another. He lets them slip inside of her in deeper until he finds a spot deep inside of her with skilled fingers. It makes her feel dizzy and wanted and taken care of. A new sensation she has never felt so deep inside of her fills her and pulsates through her belly.

There is pleasure and lust swirling in her lower belly and between her thighs. The build up of pleasure almost too much now.

'I can't...' she pants, she moans as he rubs her body against chest. He keeps her locked in one place with a strong arm and warm breath in her hair. There is a sob escaping from her lips. 'Bass...I can't..'

Bass lets out a sharp wave of breath when his heart beats strongly in his chest. There is a surge of heat moving through his heart and cock when she finally reaches out for him. Him.

But there is no smug ego, only the shattering need to hold her and make her come and hold her so fucking close he is not sure either of of them can breathe anymore.

He adds more pressure to her clit as he keeps on moving his fingers inside of her with a slow certain rhythm.

'You're okay...let go...' Bass whisper roughly in her ear... 'Let go, Charlie...'

She feels the build of impossible pressure with his harsh breathing behind her and her panting around his fingers. And when she is sure she can't take it anymore his soothing voice is close to her ear again when she tries to hold on for one second until she can't stop herself falling over the edge and she has to let go.

She comes hard, with her thighs around his hand and him pulling her towards his chest while he is muttering her name into her hair. Her thighs stay strongly around his arm clenching around hard muscles and the scared flesh on his lower arm .

Her orgasm is deep. Her body keeps on coming around his fingers and arm between her legs.

Somewhere far away she notices how Bass slowly brings her down from her pulsating heavy high with a gently brush of his hand that cools her heated skin and breathing that is out of control.

Her heavy breathing fades into slow relaxed breathing. She does not want to move. She can't move. The last thing she senses is a warm chest and Bass adjusting the blankets around her before she falls asleep.

His hand is still wrapped between her thighs as he feels the shift in her body and her weight against his chest and legs. His fingers are still soaked with her release. Her skin is still heated and warm against his shirt and he can feel her radiate through the fabric of his shirt. His shirt is soaked with his sweat. And hers.

He is still hard as fuck. But she is asleep. Her warm ass is pressed against his hard on of the fucking century. He feels the start of panic. He can't even remember how long it has been since a woman fell asleep against his chest without a presidential order telling them it was expected of them.

He thinks back to the many whores in Philly that never gave him what he truly craved for, too far gone to even admit that to himself. He thinks back to the whores in New Vegas. Drunken fucks and desperate girls who all wanted a piece of Jimmy King. He thinks back to the one woman that had pulled him away from death when he had arrived in Vegas. But Charlie is not Duncan. Hell, she is so much fucking more and she does not even know it herself.

He feels more panic in the pressure in his jaws, in the lines of his neck. There is new sweat clinging to the shirt on his back. His heart beats faster. But then her breathing evenly in his arms yanks him away from the spread of deep, dark panic.

He knows he shouldn't. He knows he should get the hell out of her bed and her room. But then he feels her hair against his scruff. He feels her asleep with so much trust in his embrace break through that panic. And the panic and the urge to leave her bed fade with every soft sound she makes in her sleep.

And when she moves closer to him in her sleep and the warmth of her body melts into his chest under the blankets, Bass finally gives in. She gives him no other choice as he falls asleep with his hand hidden between her warm toned thighs.

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 **Author's Note Thank you so much for your reviews for last chapter, I am so grateful for all of them! I will publish a new chapter next week and I hope to meet you there for another chapter? Enjoy your day! Love from Love**


	6. Chapter 6

**The first part of this new chapter is the last part of the previous chapter. Because this new chapter takes place right after that last scene, I wanted to include that here.**

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...He thinks back to the many whores in Philly that never gave him what he truly craved for, too far gone to even admit that to himself. He thinks back to the whores in New Vegas. Drunken fucks and desperate girls who all wanted a piece of Jimmy King. He thinks back to the one woman that had pulled him away from death when he had arrived in Vegas. But Charlie is not Duncan. Hell, she is so much fucking more and she does not even know it herself.

He feels more panic in the pressure in his jaws, in the lines of his neck. There is new sweat clinging to the shirt on his back. His heart beats faster. But then her breathing evenly in his arms yanks him away from the spread of deep, dark panic.

He knows he shouldn't. He knows he should get the hell out of her bed and her room. But then he feels her hair against his scruff. He feels her asleep with so much trust in his embrace break through that panic. And the panic and the urge to leave her bed fade with every soft sound she makes in her sleep.

And when she moves closer to him in her sleep and the warmth of her body melts into his chest under the blankets, Bass finally gives in. She gives him no other choice as hefalls asleep with his hand hidden between her warm toned thighs.

Secrets of Desire

6.

When Bass wakes up he slowly realizes two things. He is not in his own bed _and_ there is a lot of Charlie between his damn thighs.

He grunts something as his mind yells at him to wake the fuck up. Her tank is gone. Her long deep blonde hair brushes his knees and his thighs and _fucking hell_ , her mouth is busy doing a lot of shit he might have thought of before. Her hot breath strokes his chest as she licks her way down his belly.

Charlie deliberately moves her mouth even lower. She is sitting between his thighs, as they encircle her warm slender body. She has started with the sensitive skin around his collarbone when he had been still asleep.

Waking up with his breath in her ear, him asleep and his nose nuzzled in her hair and her body against his wide chest, muscled legs and hard cock pressing into her ass, had not felt like it should. She should have pushed him away, out of her mind, away from her body. But something else had filled her breath and belly.

It had made her think about what it would be. What _this_ would be like. She had slowly turned and slipped between his wide thighs under the warm blanket. He had muttered something in his sleep and his cock had twitched against her thigh when she had leaned over him to press her mouth against the salty skin of his neck.

She has kept the touch of her mouth feather light. But as she is making her way down his chest and stomach, _with his cock so close to her breasts now_ , she feels the urge to kiss him harder. And to let him know, it is _her_ that demands this part of him now.

Bass can't move. He just watches her. Another grunt escapes from his chest when he realizes she is not going to stop moving that mouth of hers further south.

Charlie's body is wrapped between his thighs and the endless blankets around them _._ When her mouth is dangerously close to the dark blonde hairs that move from his lower stomach to his cock, the rest of her senses take in so much more. _Warmth._ _His spicy scent that is lingering between his wide muscled thighs._ His scent fuels her need to show him what she can do to him, after he made her come with his voice so close to her ear and his arm between her thighs.

To show him she will take this where she wants to take this she skips his twitching hard cock and moves her mouth to the inside of his thigh. She gently bites and sucks as she can feel his eyes follow her mouth on his body.

Sitting between his thighs, she lets her eyes roman over his balls and strong wide cock in front of her. Her eyes move over a flat stomach and muscled chest. His eyes are burning with blue steel lust when she finally reaches his eyes. She feels another wave of need, of want, of wanting him.

She moves one of her hands from his left thigh over his chest to reach for him. Her fingertips move over his jaw line and his scruff is rough against her fingers. When she reaches for his mouth to tease his lips with her fingers, she makes sure her soft breasts make contact with his balls and cock.

'Fuck...' Bass groans in a low rough tone.

She moves her fingers from his neck to the strong lines of his chest, breathing her warm breath over his cock. She makes path with her fingers from his chest until she feels the rough curls right above his cock. She can feel the lust for finally touching his cock tingling in her fingertips and as a wave in her lower belly.

Her breasts are rubbing against the inside of his leg. They almost touch his cock. Almost. She makes sure it doesn't happen. Yet.

'Hell...Charlie...' Bass tilts his hips, feeling the urge to bring his cock closer to her mouth and tits. Fuck, this is torture.

When the hungry almost desperate way he thrusts his cock and hips towards her mouth fills her, she finally gives him what he is practically begging her for with his eyes. She moves her lips to the tip of his cock. More manly musky scent reaches her before she wraps her lips around it.

The obscene groan coming from Bass when her lips wrap themselves around his cock makes her almost moan around his cock. She fights it. Hides it into her mouth tasting him. This is about her. This is about her doing to him what he did to her.

'That's it...' Bass grunts as he encourages her. He gives in to the one thing he craves to do. He moves his hands into her hair, guiding her to where he wants her most. 'Fuck. Charlie...' He tilts her head with strong skilled fingers in her hair, the palms of his hands against her temples, '...yeah...there...' He grunts when he breathes harshly.

Charlie lets him because his large hands running through her hair makes her wet and fill her with a new sense of power.

In an ocean of warmth and his hands in her hair and his scent and her own breath and his wide thighs and warm blankets around her body, she gets lost in him as he gets lost in her. He keeps on groaning something incoherently, but she can still hear her name as low rough lust coming from deep inside his chest.

Bass can't get enough of her. He needs to keep looking at her, her hot mouth and those full lips of her around his dick. He never wants her to stop but at the same time all he wants to do is come inside that hot mouth of hers.

Her eyes are challenging and filled with the certainty that she knows exactly what the fuck she is doing. This is Charlie in control. It makes him even harder.

She looks at him while her tongue moves from his balls back to his cock. And before she is able to move her mouth over his cock again, she watches how he tries to look at her but looses that fight. The moment when he surrenders pulsates between her thighs. His face is pure sex when he comes against her belly and breasts.

His cum slowly travels over her breasts. Marking her. Watching his cum slowly dripping over and in between her tits on its way to her smooth belly, fills him with a feeling of possessiveness. It makes her his in the same fucked up way he feels about her when he watches the brand, _his brand_ , on her wrist. Bass is panting harshly as he looks at her with wide eyes and his chest that moves up and down as he tries to get some fucking air into his lunges.

Charlie looks up. She sees the shift in his eyes before he yanks her to his chest. She lands against wide hard and sweaty chest. His heartbeat is fast and strong, her lips tingling. She can still taste him. He tilts her head with his fingers under her chin. He does not say a thing. He just demands a kiss from her, breathing into her mouth. His hand is still around her shoulder as she gives in and moves her head against his chest and shoulder.

 _She does not move._ It is all his sated brain can think of.

This time, Charlie feels how he falls asleep with her head tucked under his chin. Her hand has landed on his thigh, and she softly touches the lines of his balls. She lets him. She stays with him. _Just for a while_ , she tells herself.

When he wakes up again, she is gone and it is just him and her scent wrapped in his sheets. There is a fast twitch of his mouth that almost moves into a grin, when he thinks about what the fuck just happened.

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 **Author's Note I am so sorry this update took so long! Thank you to all of you who are still reading this story. I appreciated it** _ **so**_ **much! The rest of the story is almost ready and I am working on the next two chapters right now. I will publish another chapter on Monday or Tuesday. The second chapter will be published somewhere at the end of next week as well. Love from Love**


	7. Chapter 7

Secrets of Desire

7.

Three days later

She tells Miles and Bass she is going to hunt. She is. But she also needs air. She needs to put some space between her and Bass. Both men are sitting in the living room. Two men, two glasses of booze and a comfortable silence meet her when she looks at both of them.

When she grabs her crossbow, Miles nods from his place on the couch in front of the fire. His large fingers casually around the glass of the bottle, his shoulders more relaxed than Charlie has seen in a while.

Miles knows how much she needs her space because she is so much like him. He tells her to keep her stupid to a minimum with one nod of his head. She nods back when she walks to the kitchen door. They understand each other with just that nod.

Miles' deep eyes focuses on the fire on front of him again. The glow of the fire caresses the necklace around his neck.

But Bass... _Bass_. The strength of his eyes that intentionally look for hers almost make her forget about the forest and her plans waiting for her out there. But then she reminds herself of the task that waits for her in the forest surrounding their safe house. Hunting. _Food._

So she walks outside, needing the distraction of cold wind swirling around her and the rain against her skin. Welcoming that focus on her crossbow in her hands and her next kill. But when she walks of the steps of the porch , even that brisk air and the rain softly beating against her forehead and hair, cannot push him out of her thoughts.

She had hardly slept after she had left his bed, his scent _and him_ behind. In the darkness of her own room, she had grabbed an old shirt from her bag before she had moved into her bed. Feeling his mark of release and lust still softly against the skin between her breasts.

A part of her had wanted to fall asleep after he fell asleep, wrapped in blankets and him. Sated with her own orgasm, filled with the power of his. Another part couldn't.

So she had walked back to her own room when Bass had fallen sleep. But her thoughts had been with him. They still are and it pisses her of. Her frustration is right there with her with the sounds of birds in the trees around her and in her boots hitting the forest ground under her. She needs to take a step back from images of him and her that keep on invading her mind.

Him behind her, thrusting deep inside of her standing in front of that sink, bracing herself with her fingers curled around the cool material of that sink of a small bathroom filled with shadows that one late afternoon.

Him behind her, his strong arm between her thighs and his fingers filled with skill and pleasure and inside of her, his breathing close to her ear.

His eyes, filled with lust and steel need for her, when his thighs embraced her body when she had known how he would taste, _his_ taste of musky man, his scent. _His grunts._

 _Bass._ He is close when her boots move over small pebbles and wet leaves on soft forest moss. First they fought, in every possible way. Each other. _Together._

She tried to keep him out. In every possible way. Her mind, and heart, had tried. They fucked. But with every fuck something shifts between them.

She can't stop the sigh that escapes her chest. It's a sigh filled with sated thoughts, new hunger and deep frustration. She fucks guys. For one night, maybe longer if they offer her something that is worth repeating. Then she moves on. She likes to keep things simple. She does not allow them to linger in her mind like this. Not like he is now.

It's raining as grey fills the forest. She listens to the forest, soaking it up with all her senses. Her eyes move through the spaces between the trees, looking for movements. The metal of the crossbow is pressing against her shoulders.

Autumn is slowly dripping from the leaves around her. She takes a deep breath in. She finds the path she was looking for, the one that meanders through and deeper into the forest, with ease. He also finds her.

She hears him before she sees him. She hears a low and soft sound she knows by heart by now. The sound of _his_ boots on the forest ground. She turns, quickly. She meets his eyes. They are filled with a hunger and everything that has been there since the moment she had turned on that path in another forest right outside Vegas when _he_ had found her, when she had been tracking _him_.

He had been there, blazing his eyes into hers, so blue and so harsh and so, so much, his gun in his hands. _All of him._

Bass watches her. He feels his heart beat strongly inside his chest. The advantage of a drunk brother who passes out on a couch every fucking day, is that he can slip away when he wants to. He had to follow her.

He had no fucking clue what he was going to do when he would actually find her. _Hell_ , it's that one fucking day all over again, when he had been waiting for her, close to another path, hidden behind some trees after he found the warrant posters with his god damn head on them.

He had watched her and her strength in the swing of her hips, with that son of a bitch bounty hunter walking behind her and staring at her ass while she had told him she would kind of poke his eyes out of he kept on staring at her ass. It had made the whole let's fucking knock the asshole of his damn feet so much more fun.

He is not sure what he is going to say. Or what she is. But after all the fucking, the falling asleep, the challenge in her eyes and the taste of Charlotte _, sweaty, strong sweet dept,_ he knows he is not going to just walk away from this.

She has called him delusional and he knows she has some damn good reasons to feel that way, but he is not that far gone that he cannot see something real when it is right there in front of him.

Her hair is wet from the rain and is clinging to her temples and the soft lines of her cheeks. It makes her eyes look bigger, _bluer_. It draws his attention to her hot mouth, to soft pink and the lushness of her lips and memories of what exactly she did with that mouth of hers in his god damn bed.

The path and the both of them on it, triggers memories of another forest. He can read those memories in her eyes. She is there again as well. There in a another forest filled with loathing, hate, an unconscious bounty hunter and Charlie so fucking close, telling him he was delusional. _Fuck_ , he had felt his cock twitch when she had been close enough to feel the cool loathing for him in her eyes. He had been busy telling his cock to shut up when she had been busy telling him to go to hell.

Bass feels the same lust he had felt for her then as a roar in his chest.

It is fuel for what he _will_ do next.

Charlie feels her heartbeat in her chest as she watches how one emotion after the other appear in his eyes. She cannot look away from Bass. She had tried to walk away. To look away. To push him away. She can't. Not anymore.

She remembers. She remembers standing so close to him she had been able to take in the scent of his breath. She had been able to take in the scent of his sweat and watch the strong lines of his jaw and the lines around his eyes when she had tilted his head to tell him he was delusional.

He had been tall and his chest had been close to her. She had been able to see one moment of vulnerable honesty in his eyes she had thought was fake and him getting what he needed from her, when he had told her he was going with her.

The rain makes a trail from his dark blonde curls at the nape of his neck to his strong shoulders and wide chest hidden under the black leather of his jacket. She locks eyes with him like they have done so many times before. _On the road, in one of their camps. In battle. Vegas. Austin. The war._

She slowly moves her crossbow from her shoulder without looking away from him. Looking back, it is the movement of her hand that will change everything. She waits. She watches him. She knows he will take a step towards her now she has taken this first step towards him without even moving.

He does. And when he is standing before her, so tall, so much of Bass and close enough she can see that small scar on his chest right above the line of shirt, he wraps his hand around hers and her crossbow in it. He takes it and puts it on the ground next to their boots. The intensity in his eyes burn through her.

She looks. He looks.

And then, everything that never happened when it was just them on the road somewhere between Vegas and Willoughby happens.

His mouth clashes with hers and Charlie feels the force of Bass' strength when he shoves her against a tall tree behind her. She is not sure if he is kissing her or she is fighting him with her mouth and tongue. Every single unspoken thing of the both of them fighting the past two years, finds them as it creeps into the movements of eager fingers, demanding hands and his harsh breathing, giving away how much he needs to fuck her.

Charlie wraps her arms around his wide shoulders. She feels the cool wet leather of his jacket under her fingertips. His hand claims her breast. He adds more pressure and Charlie moans without boundaries into his mouth. He is in control when he opens her pants and moves his fingers into her panties. He grunts at how wet she is. Wet for him. Charlie is out of breath when she yanks him closer to where she wants to feel him with her arms around his neck.

Bass soaks up how fucking much she wants him there with her. She moans when his fingers are moving through wetness and warmth. She demands more when her hand moves over the hard bulge of his pants.

She feels the rough pressure of the bark of the old tree behind her press into her back. She does not care. She just feels the overwhelming need to feel him fill her up. Without looking away from her and with steel hard desire in his eyes he opens his zipper.

His cock is hard warmth against sensitive wet skin when he traps her between his chest and wide thighs and the wide tree behind her. When he thrusts inside of her she closes her eyes and slowly opens her mouth to let out a moan that makes his cock respond inside of her.

Her temple brushes his moustache and she can takes in the strong salty scent of sweat on his skin. The need to get lost in him fills her together with him thrusting deeper inside of her.

Bass yanks her even closer when he buries his cock inside of her again with his large hands around her ass. It's fucking freezing and her tight warmth around his cock makes him grunt with hunger for more.

It is still raining and his sweat is mixing with the rain as he keeps on slamming into her. She is out of breath and all she can is tilt her hips so she can meets the force of each and every of his thrusts. Charlie tries to keep him out. She tries to let it just be another fuck. But with every single thrust she is losing that fight.

Bass can only look at her and fuck her when he sees the exact moment Charlie finally surrenders to him, to his arms and thrusts, and him and to whatever the fuck it is that is happening between them since the moment she found him in New Vegas.

Her moans mix with his grunts until he can hear her whisper against his scruff. 'I'm coming...Bass...I'm...I...' Another grunt escapes from his chest as she moans, when his dick hits the right spot inside of her.

'...Bass...' Her whisper fills the space between her moans and his grunts and her chest and her breasts.

He does not let her finish. It is the way she is using his name that makes him almost fucking come inside of her. He trusts _, again and again,_ adding pressure to her clit as the powerful hunger of being in control of making her come, fills his balls.

He comes right after her. He is breathing harshly when he looks at her and he finds her eyes waiting for him. Charlie pants as she is trying to catch her breath. The soft sounds of rain touching the leaves above them are close _._

And then she looks up. And she finds all of the man he is to her now, right there in his eyes. His curls stick to his forehead. Her fingers still hold on to his shirt under his jacket. She has not even noticed she reached out for him when he filled her up, but her fingers refuse to let go of his shirt.

Bass looks at her. She is not letting go of his shirt. He is not letting go of her with his eyes. Rain and sweat flow over her eyelashes. He does not say a word when he slowly moves his hand to her temple. And with a new found gentleness he brushes some wet hair out of her face.

* * *

 **Author's Note This chapter is about a shift between the both of them and I really enjoyed writing this chapter. Thank you so much for your reviews and support, it means so much to me! I will publish the next,** _ **and final chapter**_ **, next week. Enjoy your day! Love from Love**


	8. Chapter 8

Secrets of Desire

8.

She has almost reached their safe house. Her crossbow as her companion over her shoulder, two rabbits in her right hand and the memory of Bass' mouth on the sensitive skin of her neck walk with her through the forest. The scent of his leather jacket so close.

Charlie can still taste him. She can still see his eyes, right there in front of her. Filled with need and something more gentle when he had brushed some hair out of her face. She can still feel that moment swirling inside of her, the both of them hidden under wet leaves and autumn hanging over and lingering through the forest, and everything unsaid between them finally finding the both of them there.

She can still hear his voice close to her left ear right before he had walked back to the house when he had turned towards her, telling her she'd better not forget to bring home some dinner. With a grin on her face she remembers the how she had poked him between his ribs and how he had yanked her closer to pull her mouth to his for one more kiss that already contained need for more.

She walks into the house after she took care of the two rabbits she caught in the forest. When she shuts the rain out by closing the kitchen door, Miles is just shoving his bag onto the kitchen table.

There is a letter on the tabletop. Their plan was to leave in two days, to join the Rangers and help them out with a couple of smaller battles that have been happening near the north west border, but one look at Miles and Charlie knows there has been a change of plans.

'What's wrong?' Charlie asks with a serious tone in her words.

She quickly shares a look with Bass who is leaning against the side of the couch in the living room. She reaches for a towel on the kitchen counter to move the forest rain out of her face and hair. She ignores his eyes that are following the movements of her hands.

Miles looks away from her, a serious and almost painful look appearing in his eyes. One look and Charlie knows.

'This is about mom,' It's not a question.

'One of Blanchard's men just delivered this.' Miles nods to the letter on the table, 'Gene wrote the damn thing.'

Bass feels the heavy pressure of Miles' words and sees them in the way Charlie's shoulders tense. His mouth is pressed together in a thin line and his heart aches for her.

Charlie lets a deep breath escape from her lunges. She knows her mother will never be who she was. Her part in causing a worldwide blackout started that change that no one and nothing could stop. She has good weeks, and she has dark weeks.

Even when she is not with her mother right now, she knows exactly what her mother is going through and she is not sure she can give another part of herself to her mother, although another part inside of her tells her she can't look away. She silences that first part.

'All right...I am going to grab my stuff.' There is a flat tone in her words when Charlie speaks that makes Bass swallow tension away.

'No, you are not.' Miles' words are spoken in a firm way.

'Excuse me?' Charlie turns towards Miles.

' You are staying here, the both of you are still needed at the border. I will go back to Willoughby and deal with everything there.' He takes a step towards her. He looks away from her as he wants to say so much more, but old guilt keeps him locked in one place. Slowly, he turns his head, searching for her eyes. He can see her struggle in her eyes. He can breathe again when she nods. Telling him to go, telling him she understands.

Charlie is torn, but there is a part of that can breathe more easily now Miles is going back to deal with something she can't deal right now. Before she can say something Miles pulls her close to his chest, his hand now wrapped around her head. She listens to his heartbeat as she takes in the familiar scent of his shirt.

Later that afternoon Miles walks of the steps of porch. His pack over his shoulder, his two swords close to his hips. He turns to Charlie and Bass. Charlie can feel Bass right behind her.

'You morons will be all right?' Miles asks, when he looks at Bass and Charlie.

Charlie nods. 'Take care of her Miles.' Charlie's voice is soft strength when she says goodbye to Miles. There is warmth in Miles eyes, telling her he will. Charlie feels how Bass steps a bit closer to her behind her on the small porch when Miles is about to walk to his horse.

She does not see the small nod Bass gives to Miles, and the promise in it, when Bass locks eyes with his brother.

* * *

It's three days later and she and Bass find a routine that feels familiar. Somehow it has always been like this from the moment she woke up from her drug haze a couple of miles outside Pottsboro. But somehow, the both of them in this house, alone, makes more room for the both of them.

She leans against the kitchen counter as she takes a sip of water. It's dark in the kitchen and the living room, the house is quiet. The bottle that kept Miles company a couple of nights ago, is still on the table near the couch in the living room. Her crossbow is leaning against a kitchen chair, the same chair he has thrown his leather jacket over. Still sipping from the water, she walks back to her room.

When she sees that one book on her nightstand, the one she found a couple of weeks ago on a gloomy grey afternoon, she grins. She grabs it and walks back to the hallway.

* * *

Bass knows he is in some fucking serious trouble when she walks into his bedroom like she owns the damn room. But with Charlie, it is always the good kind of trouble these days, so there is a slow lazy grin forming on his face when he watches her closing the door behind her.

Charlie turns from the door towards him. She finds Bass on his bed. He is reading a book, and he has moved one of his long legs so he can rest that book against his knee. There is small fire in the fireplace. It is getting colder and the days are getting shorter. Autumn is moving into cold days and is slowly changing into another season.

'You could not stay away, huh?' Bass smirks. There is a combination of pride and strong ego in his voice that radiates from his eyes as well. His chest is swelling with the easy banter between the both of them that feels very intimate. It feels like something he has not felt in a fucking forever.

Charlie lets out an incredulous huff of air but the she can't stop the smile that is threatening to break free. She is slowly learning to look behind that smug mask of his. She crosses her arms before her chest as a last resort to try and keep him out. Then she changes her mind.

She feels Bass' eyes on her with every step she takes towards his bed. There is depth in his eyes, steel and power, control and ego. But also want, and everything he kept hidden from her. Until now.

They are not able to ignore the desire, the passion, the want and heavy pull between them that is with them in this room while the rain beats against the glass of the window and the wind howls around the house. Not anymore.

After the fucking, the surrender in her moans and his grunts when he showed her how much he wanted her when it was them in the forest, now out there in the dark, something shifted. Bass can sense it, as a slow burn in the room with them. He can sense it in her. In her eyes, in the way she looks at him, in the way she lets him in.

Her bare feet move over the wooden floor as she walks over to his bed. She feels a grin forming on her face as she sees the surprised amusing broodiness in his eyes when she moves into his bed without hesitation. The mattress is soft when it meets her legs. She can take in his scent, _and hers_ , wrapped in his sheets. She curls up under his blankets.

'Who says you are invited?' Bass grunts, following her with his eyes when she is making herself comfortable in his damn bed.

'Who says it is up to you?' Charlie locks eyes with him. She has to bite back a smirk when she notices how bad he is in trying to keep the amusement out of that low grunt.

She ignores him and keeps on doing what she was doing. Which is starting to make herself comfortable. She looks up and meets his eyes in a challenging tone of blue.

Bass grins like she has never seen him grin before. She feels how he shifts his weight in the bed when he turns towards her. It is the first time she sees that full grin of him, that moves to his eyes as it plays with the blue hidden in there. An open inviting kind of blue, once he kept hidden as a secret between all the layers of the man he became to her over the past years.

But now she knows. Now she knows it is there. He has been trying to make sure she does not unravel this part of him, but she has found it. She has tried to keep him out, in every way she could think of, but he had still managed to find parts of her she kept away and hidden from him.

'So, what you're reading?' Bass nods to the familiar book with the deep red cover that is now resting in her lap. His voice sounds like a grunt but she can hear the warmth in his voice like the slow flames in the fireplace on the other side of the room. The sound of the fire joins the sound of the rain on the rooftop and the wind beating against the walls of the house outside.

She could snarl something back. She is Charlie Matheson. She can think of at least ten things she could throw in his face.

But instead she opens the book with a slow smile around her full lips, and shows her what made her heart beat a bit faster when her eyes had found the stimulating image a couple of days ago when the light of the candle on her bed stand had kept her company and the book and her mind had brought her to new sensual places.

Bass shifts again as he makes more room for her. His arm slowly moves behind her. He feels how his cock is responding, not only to the image in that damn book but also because of her warmth radiating towards his thighs.

He presses her against his side. He swallows when he feels she does not protest.

Charlie looks at Bass. She can see his eyes light up when his eyes roam over the page. His hand moves under her shirt as he strokes and claims her lower back. Her eyes fall over the lines of his jaw and stop at the hairs of his moustache. Then she meets his eyes, softly biting her bottom lip.

He slowly closes _his_ book. His arm is still around her shoulder. His mouth is hot against her ear, his words are smug.

'We can do so much better than that...' His voice is low and gruff as he teases her.

'You think?' Charlie teases back, feeling the warmth and hard strength of his body towering over her as he yanks her closer and pushes her into the mattress.

He looks at her, as he feels the surge of control and needing her so fucking much that it makes his cock ache for her when she starts to softly moan in his arms. He makes sure he has her undivided attention before his low voice fills the room as her fingers lazily move through his moustache and scruff.

'You have no idea Charlie...'

He pulls her close as his mouth claims her. He yanks the book out of her hand before he throws it behind the both of them on the bed. He wants her to forget about that the book and feel and see him, and only him. Charlie pushes her belly against his hardness, out of breath with his mouth on hers and the promise in his words.

When she moans his name he feels a fast grin breaking through his kiss. He kisses her deeply and his tongue explores her warm inviting mouth as he gets lost in her deep moans that tell him she wants him and only him. Charlie feels the eagerness in his tall body wrapped around hers and finds burning need and more gentle blue in his eyes, _for her,_ when she pulls him closer.

Slow drops of rain move over the glass of the window. It is raining outside and now autumn is slowly moving into winter, it is the both of them alone in a safe house in the woods as a book about secrets and desire lays quietly next to the both of them, wrapped between the blankets of Bass' bed.

The End

* * *

 **Author's Note I really hope you enjoyed the final chapter of this story. I started this chapter a couple of weeks ago and I am so happy to finally publish it as the conclusion for this story. Thank you for all your support and reviews and follows. They mean so much to me. With love and gratitude for all of you, Love from Love**


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